Pink Slip is devoted to topics related - however tangentially - to the workplace, business, management, the economy, lay-offs, etc. At least that's how it started out. Now it's whatever pops into my mind.

Friday, July 25, 2014

“Weird Al”: marketing genius

As someone who’s spent her career in the technology sector, and and as a marketer, I want to take a moment on this sultry summer day to salute “Weird Al” Yankovic for his absolutely brilliant take on the Mission Statement.

Mission Statement. Vision Statement.

How many hours did I while away thinking both inside and outside the box to help come up with just the right set of words to express just what the company was about.

By now, I have blessedly forgotten the distinction between Mission Statement and Vision Statement – is mission the tactical and vision strategic?

No matter, in the word of my sister Trish, who sent me the link to this:

Weird Al really nails it in this one!

I tend to flub it when I try to embed anything from You Tube, but please go and check this one out: “Weird Al” Mission Statement. It’s definitely worth waiting through the ad.

If you’ve ever worked in business, I guarantee you’ll be amused by this one. Especially if you’ve been in tech and/or marketing. For those who haven’t had the pleasure, off there pursuing careers in odd-ball fields like teaching, law, or medicine, here’s what you’ve been missing.

As I listened through this for the first time, I started making note of what was missing: seamless, robust, scalable, best of breed, globalization.

It was as if “Weird Al”could read my mind in real-time, as there they were.

If I had a dollar for every time I used any of those words. I’d only need a dime for each use of “seamless integration” to get rich.

The only missing word that I could find was “collaboration.” (Get with it, Al.) And “paradigm shift” is just so nineties.